Pakistan's top civilian and military leaders traveled to the country's southwest on Sunday to open a new international trade route by seeing off a Chinese ship that's exporting goods to the Middle East and Africa from the newly built Gwadar port.

Israel's energy minister was holding talks in Turkey on Thursday, the first such trip since the two countries normalized ties after the 2010 crisis triggered by Israel's deadly storming of a Gaza-bound aid ship.

Saudi Arabia said on Monday it was "not unthinkable" that the price of crude oil could surge to US$60 a barrel by the end of the year but warned against drastic production cuts that might shock markets.